Christians are called to share God’s message by His Word. So in a manner of speaking, yes, He did speak to me (as well as every other believer).

Matthew 28:19-20 – NASB
19: “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,
20: teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

If you don’t believe that Jesus Christ is the risen Son of God, or you don’t believe in God Himself, then this commandment isn’t for you. Going into the world and sharing is what Christians are called to do, not those who do not believe.

I will admit that some try to force their beliefs on others forcefully. I’ve never believed that standing on a street corner, shouting at the top of your lungs was a reasonable means of evangelizing. Being obnoxious isn’t what God asked us to do.

Rather, we are called to invest ourselves in to the lives of those around us. We are to share our faith with people in a way that they are likely to listen to. You would be much more likely to listen carefully to me if we were friends than if you just bumped into me on a street corner.

The Internet makes that a bit different, but even so, I’m not forcing my beliefs upon you. You read this article and chose to respond. It wasn’t “required reading” for you, at least not in any way that I can imagine.

Truth is universal, as you say. But I believe the truth is that God exists, that Jesus Christ was and is His Son, that Jesus fully as God came to earth in the form of a man and lived among us, that He died on the cross, and that He rose again to life then returned to Heaven where He lives with God the Father.

If that is the truth, it remains the truth whether you or anyone else believes it or not.

This truth is what I am striving to found my life upon. I say striving, because I sometimes act in a way that would not demonstrate that belief. You can choose to reject that truth if you wish, but it doesn’t change the fact that it is the truth.

Regarding whether the Bible is fiction, I don’t recall writing about that, but that doesn’t mean much. As for non-Biblical writings about the facts of Jesus’ life, here are a couple of resources that might be helpful.

http://www.tektonics.org/jesusexist/jesusexisthub.html
http://www.christian-thinktank.com/jrthal.html

Who decided that? Have God spoken to you? You are taking the words of an old piece if fiction to be the ultimate truth. It indicates lack of maturity of the brain.

This very particular trait of certain christians make them so unbearable. Believe in your christ as much as you want or believe in a piece of wood or some stale water for all I care. But don’t try to impose upon you naive beliefs forcefully on the rest of the world.

It is very foolish to even imagine that certain sects have only access to the truth and no other. Truth is universal and it should be accessible irrespective of your faith in christ or not. In fact blind faith in christ is actually hindering.

You question why do some people call bible a fiction. It is a fiction because there is no proof to its authenticaty that can be traced to within hundred years of purported birth of christ. In fact christ is most likely a fiction too.
Any authentic historical figure has been mentioned in his time-period by friends or foes. christ wasn’t within 100 years or more beyond his purported lifetime. For alll I knowhe was created in crete as an imaginary person with good ideals by therapeut tribes to spread their ideals.

I don’t recall you bringing hell into the discussion.

I really find it troubling that critical thinking is such a rare commodity. If one thinks that a commercial is innapropriate for a show that should be a family show then Tom thinks they are being a censor and wants to control all speech. Gary didn’t want NYPD Blues et al taken off of the air, if he doesn’t like the content of those shows he doesn’t watch them. His suggestion would be put the racy commercials on during those shows and not during shows that a family might watch. The problem with all of these “tolerant free thinker” types is that they think we should shut up about our faith and never subject them to even the mention of God. However, if we don’t want to hear or see things they support, well tough, we are going to hear them whether we like it or not. If we complain we are branded bigots, censors, stupid, intolerant, etc.

I find it hard to believe some can’t tell the difference between violence and sporting events. When Paul made numerous references to “fighting the good fight”, “running the race” and “wrestling against”; contextual study reveals he was making reference to wrestling, “boxing” and track sporting events of his time. I don’t think Paul thought he was advocating violence.

Good post. I am going to link to it.

be what is appropriate for the audience of a TV program. For example, audiences for sports events include children. Sexualizing them is inappropriate (sorry all atheists, if you want to line up with the pro-kiddie sex group, go ahead, but expect opposition). How many “family” shows now foist “free love” sex of hetero and homo varieties on their audiences?

First of all, I’d like to say right up front that I couldn’t disagree with you more. I am an agnostic and don’t agree with your religious interpretation of the world in general, but that’s a discussion for another day.

I believe in (and this country was founded upon) the separation of church and state as well as every person’s right to the freedom of religion (or lack thereof), speech, etc. Therefore, I cannot take exception to your belief that the GoDaddy ad was inappropriate – for your children. I have 3 young children myself (ages 2-7) and don’t feel that there was anything terribly wrong with the commercial. This begs the question: where to draw the line?

I submit that we must choose the least restictive of standards in these cases. Nudity, cursing, graphic violence, and material which would be offensive to a LARGE MAJORITY of the population should be kept from the public airwaves. Most everything else should be permissible to be broadcast.
Why do I hold this position? Because it is a very slippery slope that we risk sliding down once we begin to censor “questionable” material. Today, groups of people such as yourself will be able to stop ads such as the GoDaddy Super Bowl ad. Tomorrow you could take exception to shows like Survivor (and most reality series), NYPD Blue, ER, any “beach based” show…you see my point.
I emphasized “large majority” because I think that there should be an overall concensus in the country in order to take another step down the censorship path simply because of the ramifications of taking such a step. It’s not inconceivable that, once we allow a religious moral code to be applied to society in general, my daughters will be forbidden from wearing a bikini to the beach or a skirt to school (not that either of those ideas is particularly appealing to me as a father).
In the end, we should all still have our rights as guaranteed by the constitution. GoDaddy has a right to produce “suggestive” commercials, Fox has the right to air them, I have the right to watch them, and you have the right to change the channel.